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- Creators: Department of English
- Creators: Himberg, Julia
Description
There has been a recent push for queer fiction, especially in the young adult genre, whose focus is gay and lesbian relationships. This growth is much needed in terms of visibility and the furthering of acceptance, but there are still subjects within the LGBTQ+ community that need to be addressed, including bisexual, asexual, and non-binary erasure. There are many people who claim that these identities do not exist, are labels used as a stepping stone on one's journey to discovering that they are homosexual, or are invented excuses for overtly promiscuous or prudish behavior. The existence of negative stereotypes, particularly those of non-binary individuals, is largely due to a lack of visibility and respectful representation within media and popular culture. However, there is still a dearth of non-binary content in popular literature outside of young adult fiction. Can You See Me? aims to fill the gap in bisexual, asexual, and non-binary representation in adult literature. Each of the four stories that make up this collection deals with an aspect of gender and/or sexuality that has been erased, ignored, or denied visibility in American popular culture. The first story, "We'll Grow Lemon Trees," examines bisexual erasure through the lens of sociolinguistics. A bisexual Romanian woman emigrates to Los Angeles in 1989 and must navigate a new culture, learn new languages, and try to move on from her past life under a dictatorship where speaking up could mean imprisonment or death. The second story "Up, Down, All Around," is about a young genderqueer child and their parents dealing with microaggressions, examining gender norms, and exploring personal identity through imaginary scenarios, each involving an encounter with an unknown entity and a colander. The third story, "Aces High," follows two asexual characters from the day they're born to when they are 28 years old, as they find themselves in pop culture. The two endure identity crises, gender discrimination, erasure, individual obsessions, and prejudice as they learn to accept themselves and embrace who they are. In the fourth and final story, "Mile Marker 72," a gay Mexican man must hide in plain sight as he deals with the death of his partner and coming out to his best friend, whose brother is his partner's murderer.
ContributorsOchser, Jordyn M. (Author) / Bell, Matt (Thesis director) / Free, Melissa (Committee member) / Department of English (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
Netflix has positioned itself at the forefront of the future of television with its original programming, which has been rolled out in greater and more frequent amounts just in the last couple of years. The streaming service has already experimented with creativity in ways most other shows and creators haven't, playing with the pacing of overall seasons as well as the length of episodes. So, too, Netflix has been at the forefront of increasing visibility for minority characters on television. Many of its shows incorporate racially diverse casts and depict lots of LGBTQ characters, a refreshingly realistic view of the world that many of its viewers have always lived in but haven't yet witnessed on television. Visibility and representation are critical concepts for analyzing minority characters on television. It is important for diverse characters to be seen, first and foremost, but also to be seen in positive or at least realistic lights. Care must be taken to avoid fulfilling stereotypes or tropes, and attention must be paid to what has happened to other characters who have come before. However, many of Netflix's portrayals of these characters, particularly bisexual characters, leave much to be desired. With the original dramas House of Cards, Hemlock Grove, Orange is the New Black, and Sense8, all of which include characters who identify as or behave bisexually, Netflix has been reluctant to use the specific word bisexual to describe characters, and many don't even identify their sexuality with a synonym for the term. Many of the bisexual characters that I identified died or were killed on the shows, and nearly all of them fulfilled stereotypes or tropes in some way. There were multiple scenes of threesomes or other distinctly kinky sexual encounters, which served to exoticize bisexuality and distance it from the more normatively viewed identities of heterosexuality and homosexuality. Ultimately, while Netflix's original programming has offered increased visibility to bisexual characters, it has yet to reflect the real community it seeks to portray. In particular, Netflix's refusal to label characters as bisexual is frustrating and limiting. It can be argued that this is a progressive move toward more ideas of sexual fluidity and a post-modern lack of sexual labels, but there are not enough depictions of identified bisexual characters on television yet for this to make sense. Until bisexual characters and their identities are not invisibilized or stigmatized, more work has to be done to ensure that bisexual people are represented fairly and accurately on television and in all media.
ContributorsKoerth, Kimberly Marie (Author) / Himberg, Julia (Thesis director) / Sturges, Robert (Committee member) / Department of English (Contributor) / College of Public Service and Community Solutions (Contributor) / Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication (Contributor) / School of Social Transformation (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05
Description
The television industry has experienced major changes in the past decade that have affected our behaviors, expectations, and perceptions of the world. New services offer different methods of consuming media and shift the way the industry defines television. The following research reflects on past trends in television history and the current landscape in order to understand how television will continue to evolve, adapt, or return to old practices as it reacts to audiences' needs. From the growth of binge-watching to the proliferation of connected devices and digital technologies, the television industry faces many new challenges and opportunities. Consumers have shifted from the post-network era of cable's dominance to the leading online, digital services that enhance consumers' desires to have television anywhere and everywhere. Although these changes threaten the industry's current advertising models, they also present new ways for networks to connect with quality audiences, and thereby, shape our identities and consumer culture. This study analyzes the influence of these changes and considers how the current state of the television industry may continue to change in the future.
ContributorsDorsey, Caitlin Renee (Author) / Himberg, Julia (Thesis director) / Haggins, Bambi (Committee member) / Department of English (Contributor) / W. P. Carey School of Business (Contributor) / Department of Marketing (Contributor) / Department of Information Systems (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-12
Description
Queering Shakespeare: The Tragedy of Hamlet and Horatio is a creative project that reimagines Shakespeare's Hamlet. Inspired by my own experiences as a queer teen, the play explores how gender and sexual identities affect the lives of queer youth. Hamlet is reimagined as a polyamorous, transgender man, who is dating a lesbian Ophelia and nonbinary Horatio. The play is told from the perspective of Horatio, who has lived through the tragedy to tell Hamlet's story. They present the events through a compilation of personal videos, filmed from a variety of perspectives. The interactions between the characters of the play showcase the importance of open communication with friends, partners, and family members, while touching on issues of abusive relationships and mental illness. The project aims to foster discussion on the use of Shakespearean adaptation for modern audiences and create more LGBTQ+ representation in media.
ContributorsLindenberg, Jessica Rose (Author) / Himberg, Julia (Thesis director) / Irish, Bradley (Committee member) / School of Geographical Sciences and Urban Planning (Contributor) / School of Sustainability (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2017-05
Description
I've spent the last four-plus years in Arizona studying to earn a degree that hopefully will get me an interesting and well-paying job. Unfortunately, I'm not sure that my Filmmaking Practices degree will adequately describe what I've done with my time at Arizona State University. In addition to studying film, I spent my first year in the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication; I wrote for, acted in, and later directed and hosted the webshow Devil's Chowda for The State Press; I did marketing for companies including HBO and RAW Rolling Papers; I performed improv comedy every week with Barren Mind Improv for two semesters; I wrote and acted in Farce Side Comedy Hour sketch comedy this past semester. It is clear that my interests do not lie in one area \u2014 my education is mostly in film, my resume is mostly marketing, and my extra-curricular interests lie mostly in comedy. To best prepare myself for the job market post-graduation, I believe that I need an example of my work to show a prospective employer that I have knowledge beyond how a camera works and the films of Steven Spielberg. To do this, I have chosen to create two spec advertising campaigns for large companies: Heinz and Burger King. This allows me to use my knowledge in film, marketing, and comedy all at once. The Heinz campaign revolves around real-world experiences of children using their French fry as a utensil rather than a food item. The Burger King campaign is based around a limited-time offer to get an entry code into a contest for a bathtub full of chicken nuggets. Each campaign is fleshed out with video advertisement storyboards, audio advertisement scripts, print advertisement mock-ups, and social media hashtags and plans.
ContributorsMiller, Daniel Jordan (Author) / Haggins, Bambi (Thesis director) / Himberg, Julia (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2015-12
Description
As of 2022, suicide is the second leading cause of death for young people ages 12-24. For adolescents who identify as part of the LGBTQIA+ communities, the rates of suicide contemplations and attempts are as high as four times more likely compared with their heterosexual or cisgender peers. As of 2022, 45% of LGBTQIA+ youths have contemplated suicide. LGBTQIA+ teens are also more likely to experience bullying and discrimination. Despite extensive research conducted by The Trevor Project pointing to the importance of representation in the media for these LGBTQIA+ teens, governors, state legislatures, and school boards around the United States have made it their mission to deny these teens access to literature that feature LGBTQIA+ characters. As of September 2022, one in four books that are banned across the country from school libraries contain LGBTQIA+ characters. In order to combat this lack of access to LGBTQIA+ Young Adult literature, I created a resource website that acts as a safe space for queer teens to explore literature that features teens who identify like they do. The purpose of my website is threefold. First, I aimed to create a joyous space for teens to discover LGBTQIA+ literature. Second, I provided resources and information about different sexualities and gender identities for anyone who might want more information on these topics. And third, I wanted to prove to website visitors that they are not alone, regardless of how they may be negatively treated at home or at school. To accomplish these three goals, I created specific pages on the website, such as book recommendation pages compiled with research of LGBTQIA+ YA books paired with my own knowledge and resource pages informed by outside research such as my hotlines, LGBTQIA+ terminology, statistics, and gender identity explained pages. I also include a handful of author interview pages, which highlight written interviews I conducted with a few critically acclaimed queer YA authors. I provide screenshots and explanations in the following pages.
ContributorsTomlinson, Jill (Author) / Blasingame, James (Thesis director) / Konigsberg, William (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of English (Contributor) / Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Comm (Contributor)
Created2022-12